


scythe of the accursed

by PikaCheeka



Category: Final Fantasy XV
Genre: Dehumanization, Don't copy to another site, Illness, Internalized Homophobia, Kidnapping, Loyalty Kink, M/M, Possessiveness, Powerlessness, Rape, Rape By Deception, Sadism, Sex Videos, Torture, Unreliable Narrator, copious abuse of recovery items
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-01-14
Updated: 2019-01-14
Packaged: 2019-10-05 21:09:56
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 3
Words: 14,295
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17332409
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/PikaCheeka/pseuds/PikaCheeka
Summary: Ardyn enjoys Ignis over fourteen long nights in Zegnautus Keep.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Lagerstatte](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Lagerstatte/gifts).



> Bumped once for event reveal. This is a fic I had started ages ago, only to write about 600 words and shelf it. Fast forward a few months, when I was asked if I could do a pinch-hit for a gift exchange. When I saw the request letter, I realized the 600-word scrap I'd abandoned worked well for it, so I picked up the idea, revised it, and just rolled with it for another 14K words. I incorporated as much of the letter as I reasonably could into it (couldn't work with the AU bit but I THINK I got almost all of the kinks in, as well as a few of the specific plot requests and ending preference). It's probably cheating a little, so I'm sorry about that! I hope you enjoy it though!

 

  1. **sword of the father (Father King)**



_A king was father to the Chosen One and nurtured the light that would shine upon all creations. This was his mighty sword. It makes the great greater._

* * *

 

“I imagine as retainer to the king, you have quite the education in history, do you not?”

That voice is not what Ignis wants to wake up to. He snaps his eyes open long enough to see the shadow only to groan and cover his face. Too bright. Too bright. He doesn’t know where he is.

“I should have warned you it’s bright in here.” Ignis can hear him crouching down as he speaks, as if they were merely carrying on a casual conversation.

“Here?” He cracks his eyes open again, slowly this time, and keeps a hand over his face so that Ardyn can’t see in what direction he’s looking.

“Zegnautus Keep. The grand laboratory of the illustrious Niflheim Empire, which seems to have expanded quite a bit in recent weeks.”

Nothing in any direction that he can see without moving, nothing but metal beams and sterile white lights. He has to move, roll to his side, get up, _run_ , but he can feel every beat of his heart in the back of his eye sockets. A concussion. His entire body hurts as he comes to, but there’s nothing ablaze with pain beyond his head, and that’s something.

“I’m afraid I broke your glasses when I kicked you in the face.” Ardyn has an unnatural ability to answer questions before they are asked. “Well, head. I tried to keep from damaging your face too much. It’s a shame I did what I did but it can’t be helped.”

 _Kicked you in the face._ That explains a lot. He touches his face gingerly. Everything is intact but for a gash over his right eyebrow, so deep he draws a sharp gasp when his fingers graze it.

“I stopped the bleeding, but it will scar,” he says good-naturedly. “You should probably rest a bit. Don't worry about anyone else. It’s just us here.”

“That’s what concerns me.” _Here? In the entire Keep?_ Impossible; it’s the primary war machine of the empire. But he can’t worry about that right now.

“Such audacity after I saved your life.”

And then he remembers. “Noctis!”

Ardyn is there, a hand slamming into his chest and pushing him back to the floor. “Down, boy. He’s fine. I lingered until your other charming friends came to collect him. They seemed a little troubled that you were nowhere to be seen but of course, you’re irrelevant at the end of the day.”

“Why should I believe you?”

“Because you have no choice, you nitwit. What are you going to do? Jump out the window? Have fun finding one.” he sneers.

He flexes his hands once, twice, and tries to will his daggers into existence. _Nothing_. It’s only as he expects. _Noctis is fine, Noctis is fine._ He feels like he’s going to be sick. He closes his eyes against the pressure behind them and tries to think. The first order is to determine exactly where he is. He has little hope of survival, much less escape, but he knows it will calm his mind if he is able to begin plotting something. “Is the Keep docked? Are we in Gralea?”

“I suppose, but don’t you want to talk about Noctis? How fortunate he is, to have you care so deeply for him. Unfortunate for you though, as he shall meet his end soon enough.”

The comment is at sharp odds with his disgust at Ignis asking about him only moments before, and Ignis feels his anxiety growing. He wonders for a moment if Ardyn really had kicked something loose in his brain, wonders if he’s missing words, phrases, whole minutes of the conversation, because Ardyn is all over the place. He sits up slowly, warily, but the older man makes no attempt to push him down again, and so he rests back against the wall behind him and tries to still the pounding in his head.

“ _A king was father to the Chosen One and nurtured the light that would shine upon all creations_ ,” Ardyn waits before Ignis is upright before continuing. “Almost all, anyway. You’ve heard that one before, haven’t you?”

It hits him then. The vision he’d had before….before _this_ , whatever this might be. _To cast out the Usurper and usher in dawns light will cost the life of The Chosen._ Noctis. Chosen by the Astrals to exchange his life for the freedom of the world.  He gasps sharply

“Ah, ah ah! Looks like you have. They really should just call it _the Condemned One_ and be done with it, don’t you agree?” He stands, jumping back a pace as he does before bringing one foot forward to nudge Ignis’ knee. “Well. I’ll leave you to stew over that one for a bit.”

He grits his teeth and hisses softly. _I won’t rise to this. He doesn’t know what I know. He doesn’t know that I know who he is. The Usurper._ He wonders if Emperor Aldercapt knows this man’s ambitions, if he can find a way to work it to his advantage. He’s sat through enough tedious meetings in the courts to know what Aldercapt is like; he won’t take well to insubordination, and as much as Ignis despises him, he knows that sowing dissent within enemy ranks is highly effective. Anything to not think about his vision. “What do you want with me?”

“Come now, Ignis. Oughtn’t we get to know one another? You _agreed_ to come with me.”

“That doesn’t answer my question.”

Ardyn smiles, lazy and leonine, and raises his hand in half a salute before turning sharply on one heel and leaving the room. And Ignis is left alone, the sharp pain behind his eyes replaced with bottomless dread.

 

 

  1. **katana of the warrior (War King)**



_A king was changed forever when his beloved queen was taken from him prematurely. This was his katana. It is drawn and strikes in a single heartbeat._

* * *

 

“I see you’ve found the food and water I’ve left out for you. And the latrine? It even has a little shower. I thought you’d find that a nice touch, after sleeping in a tent for so many weeks. It must be a luxury, here.”

Ignis is sitting on one of the two cots Ardyn had left in the barracks. Two, because that might unnerve him a bit more. And Ignis is not looking particularly pleased. Exhausted and anxious, though it looks like he’d at least cleaned the blood off his face and arms. “It’d be nicer if I could turn the light off to sleep,” he quips.

 _That’s the point, you idiot._ But he ignores him. It’s an understandable complaint given the harshness of the light. Ardyn doesn’t like it either, but he tolerates what he must. “Though I suppose you must get a little…lonely here, hm? Brave Gladiolus and dear Prompto too busy with Noctis now to even think about you.”

If Ignis were a coeurl, his hackles would be raised now, but he stands to face Ardyn.

“Do you think he’s awake yet?” He isn’t. He won’t be for a long time yet. Ardyn had cursed him when he was down on his knees, pretending to be about to stab him. Noctis is certain to be out for at least a week, probably longer. “Maybe he’ll think of you when he wakes up, but maybe not. Drivers and chefs are easily replaceable, last I checked.”

Ignis is so much more, of course. An intelligent adviser and a cunning strategist, and oh, so attractive. Passionate and loyal and resilient. _I would have killed to have someone like you by my side all those centuries ago._ But King Noctis doesn’t take advantage of everything Ignis has to offer. Ardyn knows this, and Ignis knows this, too.

“ _A king was changed forever when his beloved queen was taken from him prematurely._ That’s the sort of thing people write stories about. I don’t recall any stories about someone coming to rescue the chauffer, do you?”

But Ignis surprises him, meeting his gaze with those piercing green eyes that fill Ardyn with a visceral _need_. “I came here willingly. Why do you expect me to wait for him when I’ve already decided it’s more advantageous to be on the winning side?”

Ardyn cocks his head. So clever. Of course it’s a lie, but his efforts are charming even if he isn’t the best actor. So young, after all. He simply lacks the experience, but he could go far if he survives. All said without even a tremor, and he maintained eye contact the entire time. _He’d regret that if he knew what those eyes did to me._ So Ardyn purrs, “Pardon me for not trusting you immediately.”

Ignis narrows his eyes, straightens his back ever-so-slightly so that he is as tall as he can be. “I wouldn’t expect anything less.”

“Then you don’t mind if I…” Ardyn shoves him back, reveling in the gasp of anger and _apprehension_. Only one day in captivity and he’s already like this. This should be fun. He lunges forward then, half-warping in such a way that he merely _looks_ fast, and grabs his shoulders, his biceps, before groping his chest. “I blocked your magic and banished your weapons but better to make sure here…”

“Ardyn!” He snarls, grabs Ardyn’s wrists only to let go immediately as if burned. Likely because he remembered his lie. “That’s not. Necessary.”

“Oh, silly me. And I thought you had pockets on that shirt,” he rakes his fingers down his chest once more for good measure before grabbing his hips. _Why do kids these days wear such obscenely tight pants?_ It’s as if he doesn’t know what kind of danger he’s in. Ignis’ thighs and ass are compact, in part due to nerves but Ardyn can tell immediately what kind of body he has. _A nice one._ Trim hips and a flat belly, pert ass and long legs.

He pulls the phone from his back pocket and glances at it. Screen shattered, the whole thing assuredly waterlogged and damaged beyond any repair Ignis might be capable of, just as he expected. _Still_. It might be amusing to look through if he can fix it. Magic can do wonders on machinery if only someone knows how best to use it. He pockets it, ignores the huff of indignation from Ignis, and goes back to manhandling him. He runs a hand up the inside of his thigh, receiving another sound out of outrage from the younger man before he feels something else in one of his front pockets.

The Ring.

“Oh, what have we here?”

Ignis pales, so much so that Ardyn absently wonders if he’s going to faint. _He doesn’t know I can’t use it, doesn’t know that I need Noctis to have this. He probably thinks this is what I was after all along._ Ardyn’s lips curl in delight. Oh, the taste of innocence.

“Naughty, _naughty_ you, stealing the Ring of the Lucii.”

Ignis is silent, withdrawn and defeated now, smaller than he’d been only a moment ago. Ardyn considers grabbing him again, this time in a more private place, but decides against it. He will have a long time to enjoy Ignis Scientia, and it’s better to let him believe he is safe from such matters.

“You didn’t plan on using this against me, did you?”

“No,” he meets his eyes now, brave and furious even if stupid. His eyes are pretty, and Ardyn wonders how good his eyesight is without his glasses as the boy goes on. “I only held it for safekeeping.”

“It’s safe now. With me. Just like you.”

His courage is admirable as he continues to glare furiously at him. “How long are you going to keep me here?”

“I don’t trust you yet. Give me a few days.”

“I don’t even know what day it is right now.” _Clever, Ignis Scientia is._ A grab for information, because even the slightest bit will ground him. Ardyn knows the type.

“Night and day are quickly growing irrelevant. I will keep track of the time for you.” For all of Ignis’ talk of willingly joining him, this fact makes him pale, and Ardyn bares his teeth in a grin. He hopes that Noctis will be out longer than a week. Much longer.

 

 

  1. **swords of the wanderer (Lion King)**



_A king was quick like the wind and went where no man had gone before. These were his blades. Apart they rain fury-together they delivered thundering blows._

* * *

 

He’s certain it’s only been two days, that this is now the third. He hadn’t expected the inability to keep time himself would be so unnerving. Because there is no sun here, and no schedule. Ardyn appears erratically, feeds him at bizarre intervals only he can fathom, and Ignis knows that the longer he is here, the more his sense of time will deteriorate. He doesn’t like this at all. He still hasn’t seen or heard anyone else in the Keep and considering the fact that Ardyn just brought his army down on a supposedly neutral city and demolished it, he seems to have an awful lot of time to waste.

So the next time he appears, Ignis asks him. “Isn’t there a war going on? Why aren’t you with him?”

Ardyn yawns, and Ignis is momentarily mesmerized by how sharp his teeth are, how wide his jaws open. “Who?”

“The Emperor. You’re the Chancellor, aren’t you?” It crosses Ignis’ mind then that Ardyn is not the Chancellor, never was. Perhaps he’d only ever been a petty officer, an unstable relative of the emperor who was given a false role to make him feel good. Because how can anyone who’s truly the Chancellor forget for even a second what he’s doing?

“Oh, Iedolas.” Ardyn sounds vaguely disgusted. “He’s been…indisposed.”

“Does he know I’m here? Let me speak to him.” He has no leverage. He _knows_ he has no leverage. But he needs to try, because clearly Ardyn is not interested in doing anything with him. He’s like an oversized cat who catches mice only to let them loose in the house and look around expectantly as if someone else will clean up their mess.

Ardyn shrugs and fiddles with his phone, avoids eye contact as he vaguely comments, “I’m not his keeper. He lets me do my own thing.”

 _Do my own thing_. He tries to recall every interaction he’s had with this man, every time he’s seen him, tries to place them in a map so that they fit, but there is no rhyme or reason to this man’s movements that he can discern. “Are you even the Chancellor? How can you expect me to work with you if you fail to even tell me what’s going on here?”

“I’m not sure there’s much Niflheim left to be Chancellor _of_.” There’s something very maladjusted about the way he says it, as if he’s _delighted_ , and Ignis feels something inside of him twist in fear. Something is very, very wrong here, and he can’t quite place what it is.

“What are you talking about?”

He shrugs again.

It’s enough. Enough to convince him. The calculated indifference has unnerved him enough that he decides to run for it. _Because this man is clearly mad and he’s unstable enough to do something horrible._ He wants to be with his prince, his friends. His prince. He remembers the voice in his head, grits his teeth and shivers. He refuses to believe this man is the Usurper, the one to be so feared, but he wants to be with Noctis, to protect him, regardless.

He makes it farther than he expects to, if only because Ardyn had scarcely even looked at him when he quickly walked through the door. He makes it out into the open, into one of the massive caverns of the keep, titanium walls yawning open into a domed ceiling, down one corridor and another, every door, every corner the same. It’s futile. He must know this place. He practically lives here. But still he runs, and as he ducks down another hallway, peers into the darkness of another room and senses no sign of life, he feels a surge of hope. He might not know where he is, but he knows that if he keeps moving in any one direction, he can find a way out _eventually_. Ardyn can’t be everywhere at once. Until he stumbles into what looks like a control room only to find _him_ there.

Ardyn, sitting perfectly poised on top of one of the control panels. The room is not quite in disrepair, but the sheer absence of any life, of any mess indicating a human recently used it, unnerves Ignis.

“ _A king was quick like the wind and went where no man had gone before_ ,” he murmurs softly, now gesturing towards one of the screens on the walls. “Or where a thousand men had gone before. You’re really not so clever, are you?”

 _Of course there would be security cameras._ Ardyn moves fast, so fast that Ignis thinks for a moment he sees Noctis in his movements. He can warp. The notion hits him just as Ardyn does, a forearm slamming into chest so hard he half spins around, and then the man is crushing him to the wall. He’s alarmingly heavy, and much taller than Ignis had ever realized.

“You really should have kept your little charade up a little longer, _Ignis Scientia_. It’s only your third day here and you’ve already angered me.”

It doesn’t occur to him, doesn’t cross his mind until Ardyn grabs his wrist and twists his arm behind his back and drags him along the wall. Until Ardyn shoves a hand between his legs, runs fingers up his thigh before fondling him and curling behind to grab his ass. That’s when he realizes, when he understands what Ardyn _wants_ from him, and the bottom drops from his stomach as he jerks to the side, stumbles.

“No, no. Ardyn. I can’t.” He doesn’t know why he’s being polite about it, why he’s behaving as if this is a reasonable transaction when inwardly he is screaming in horror. _This kind of thing doesn’t happen. Not to men. Not to those with connections to the royal family. Not to people like me._ But it does and he knows it does.

“Can’t what?” He purrs, a lilt in his voice now as he shoves Ignis again, hand lingering at his hip.

“Can’t.” He just stops, unsure of what to say. _I’m not going to give you the satisfaction of my fear, of me saying what I think you want from me._ But he doesn’t have to say anything more, because Ardyn lays a single finger on his chest and pushes. He pushes and then he shoves him _down_.

“Of course you can. It will take a little getting used to but…”  he shrugs lazily, and Ignis is suddenly very aware of how large Ardyn is, how leonine and powerful he is beneath his layers of coats.

“ _Ardyn_ ,” he says again, raising his voice in a warning. _But I can do nothing against him._

“How big do you think I am? Eight inches? Ten? _Girth_ matters more though, I hear.”

“I don’t care.” But he does care. He cares a lot, because while Ardyn will probably make it hurt no matter what, it will be easier to bear if he’s at least a normal size. He won’t be. Nothing about this man is normal.

“Don’t worry about it. I can heal you afterwards.” He shoves him again, this time roughly enough that Ignis stumbles and falls.

“I don’t want your false kindness,” he snarls, but he doesn’t feel half as brave as he sounds as he brings his feet beneath him and glances around the cell. Precious little for him to use as a weapon. No chance of escape if he runs. He doesn’t like this, doesn’t like this at all.

“I think you will change your mind.” He pauses and grins, and Ignis sees those teeth again that suddenly seem less than human. _There’s something wrong with him, something feral and inhuman and monstrous._ Ignis is unaware of the sound in his throat as he scrabbles backwards a few places on the floor and feverishly tries to summon his daggers, a spear, anything, _anything_. Because something in those teeth, those eyes, has driven the resolve from his bones and he now feels nothing but terror.

Cold and bottomless terror.

He’s too scared to move, too petrified to even resist as Ardyn now calmly grabs his belt, rips it off and unzips his fly and _oh so gently_ pulls his pants down. _I should run. I should fight him. I should resist. I should die before I let this happen to me._ But those teeth. Those eyes.

He _sighs_ when he sees him, and the look in his eyes makes Ignis dizzy with fear and _shame_.

“Make yourself comfortable, Ignis Scientia. It might be the last comfort you ever have.”

 _Don’t speak my name as if you know me_ , he wants to snap, but when he opens his mouth, he finds that his voice has abandoned him.

 

 

  1. **mace of the fierce (Demon King)**



_A king was gentle before his people but an ogre on the battlefield. This was his mace. It deals crippling blows to mighty foes._

* * *

 

He doesn’t break yet. But it doesn’t deter Ardyn, because he knows he will have much time to enjoy Ignis Scientia.

The dawning horror on his face is beautiful. He’d clearly never thought such a thing could happen to him before. Because even though Ignis is long-legged and thin and pretty, even though he’s cunning and clever and he turns heads wherever he goes, he must have believed himself immune to such advances.

And then, when he understands, he does nothing. He sits there on the floor frozen while Ardyn grabs him by the hips, drags him forward and begins stripping him. Ardyn has seen this kind of fear before, this kind of disbelief locking one’s limbs. He had been the same when his execution had been announced so many centuries ago now, and it almost makes him pity Ignis. _Almost_. But Ignis Scientia has lived a life of luxury in the citadel that should have been Ardyn’s, eating out of the hand of the king over a hundred generations removed from the source of his loathing, but still guilty of being a Lucis Caelum all the same. And Ignis’ role in destiny is tragic, but nothing like his own.

It’s hard to not be bitter as he rips his shoes off and drags his pants down. _So tight. Why is this necessary, Ignis? What did you expect would happen if you wore such clothing?_ He almost says something, but he suspects the man, the _boy_ , wouldn’t hear it.

It’s more fun from the front, more fun to be able to watch his prey’s face, to make them feel even more vulnerable as he stares at their agony. It’s easier to feel their frantic heartbeat, to inhale their desperate breaths and bask in their screams when one is facing them. But Ignis is spitfire incarnate, strong and vicious and fast. Ardyn isn’t concerned about being hurt by him, and he does like a struggle, but he wants him to be still enough to properly fuck him, and he suspects that if Ignis can rally, he could make that surprisingly difficult.

“I can dislocate a shoulder or a knee. Which do you prefer?”

“What?” he chokes out.

“I don’t trust you not to try to get away, so one has to go. Choose now or I’ll pop a hip out. I might anyway from fucking you as hard as I plan to.”

But Ignis only spits at him. _If only he knew how much that arouses me._ But there can be no winning for Ignis. Ardyn likes his fire, but he also knows he will lap up his despair just as willingly.

“Suit yourself.” And he wrenches his legs apart, pushes his knees up against his chest and then outwards, wedges his body between them so that Ignis can’t immediately lower them. And he grabs the underside of Ignis’ hip, digs nails into the meat of his thigh and twists. Even when Ardyn was human, he had the strength to break necks with his bare hands; with the Scourge coursing through his veins, the immortality of a thousand demons residing in his marrow, dislocating Ignis’ hip is _easy_. “This will make fucking you easier anyway,” he mutters, though more to himself than to Ignis, who is now screaming impressively loud.

He’s _tight_. Alarmingly tight. But Ardyn has long ago lost much of his ability to feel physical pain, and the mild discomfort of taking Ignis dry is irrelevant when compared to the power he feels when doing it. To be fucking, raping, ravaging, the hand of the king. The adviser to the last of the Lucis Caelum line. The strategist who could have one day grown up to take down Niflheim with his mind. The adopted brother who has been granted the power of the Astrals, who can see the future and weep for it.

He makes Ardyn feel _divine_.

He’s tight and he’s hot and so very wet inside, throbbing and constricting around him as Ignis howls. But he draws him in, and Ardyn groans in delight and satisfaction. _I haven’t had such a good fuck in decades._ Because inside of Ignis he feels a dizzying power so close at his fingertips; he can sink his claws into this man and come away dripping with blood that has been blessed by the line that executed and exiled him, blessed by the gods that betrayed him. Oh yes, there is something about Ignis Scientia that _does_ something to Ardyn.

And he never wants to let him go.

And he’s loud. Much louder than Ardyn had expected given how stuffy and buttoned up he always acted. He screams and he groans and he sobs freely, but still he resists. Because even with a dislocated hip, even while being fucked so violently that he might as well be being gutted, Ignis fights him, repeatedly trying to drag himself away, biting and snapping whenever Ardyn gets near his face, and raking nails over every bit of bare skin he can find. It only drives Ardyn to a fever pitch of need though, and he groans a thousand praises into the younger man’s ear as he thrusts to completion inside of him.

It’s only then, finally, for a few seconds, when he feels that Ignis might give up, because he lets out a startled sob when Ardyn climaxes inside of him, and he goes limp, his breathing low and ragged.

He finally leans back, shoves the heel of a hand into Ignis’ belly as he drags himself out of him, a gush of blood and come following. Ardyn watches him for a moment, mesmerized by how he can _see_ Ignis’ heartbeat in the gaping hole between his legs.

“That was fun, hm?” he finally murmurs, now pressing a finger against Ignis’ perineum. “It’d be nice if you’d orgasmed but we can always try again later.”

And to his delight, Ignis kicks him with his good leg then, a crackling sob rippling through him as the movement must hurt him horribly.

He catches his ankle, viciously pulls it hard enough that Ignis groans, another pulse of blood dripping from between his legs. “I like the fight in you,” he purrs softly, aware of the fear emanating from the younger man. Very aware. He wonders if he could take him again, right now. No, better to wait. He will have time enough to enjoy this, he thinks as he leans in then, brushes lips against a bruised ear. “Boy, _I think I’m going to keep you_.”

And oh, but his lungs are _impressive_.

 


	2. Chapter 2

 

  1. **shield of the just (Merciful King)**



_A queen devoted herself to peace and was loved by all. This was her shield. It deflects blows and bolsters recovery when raised in defense._

* * *

 

He wakes up screaming.

And he doesn’t quite know why. It’s only when he begins shaking, when he rolls over and hangs his head over the edge of the mattress to vomit into the bowl he’d left there the night before, when he realizes that he’s breathing a touch too fast, his heartbeat a touch too loud, that he remembers.

A nightmare. _Ardyn_. Massive and looming over him, a black shroud devouring his body as he hunches over him and sucks down his breath. It takes him a moment to process the images in his mind, to even understand what dances behind his eyelids now. Ardyn hurting him. Ardyn not fighting him, not beating him, but Ardyn _raping_ him. Brutally. Repeatedly. Laughing as he does it. Goading him on and saying he wants to _keep_ him.

Ardyn slapping him, suffocating him as he shoves his way between his legs and inside of him. Half-choking him as he guts him with his cock and thrusts into him with enough force to break bones. Ardyn doing something to his body beforehand, breaking his leg, his wrist, _something_. He is in too much pain to even know _where_ the pain is emanating from any longer. He can feel the blood running down his thighs, the horrible burning sensation as every nerve in his body screams in protest, the sense of invasion as something hot and _alive_ devours him from the inside out, the fear that something inside of him is broken beyond repair. The _hope_ that it is, because if he’s dying, then he won’t have to suffer this again.

Even thinking of it has him trembling again. Ignis has had nightmares before, but something about this one bothers him. _It’s too real, too visceral. Maybe because it was a sex dream. I’ve so rarely had those. I’m not used to them. And they are different from other sorts of dreams, after all, more prone to causing physical reactions. It makes sense that I’m like this._

But he can’t believe it, because something feels wrong. So wrong. And he gingerly begins exploring his body, pulls his pants down and examines his thighs, his ass. There are no bruises. There is no blood. There is a dull ache in his backside and his left leg is a little sore, but so subtle it could merely be from falling on his ass the other day. There is no skin beneath his fingernails, no teeth marks on his throat. Using potions leaves a telltale sensation that lingers for hours, especially if the wounds it heals are severe. And whatever Ardyn had done to him, if he had done anything at all, was severe. Could I have been in a coma, healed on my own over a long period? He can’t imagine Ardyn caring for him in such a state, but there is no other explanation.

So when he hears the footsteps at the door, he immediately sits upright and glares furiously at the doorway. He will attack him when he sees him, demand answers.

But things never go as planned.

He finds that he can barely look at him. Because he can feel him, taste him and smell him. He’d never noticed the cut of Ardyn’s jaw before, the hollows of his cheekbones or the lengths of his eyelashes. He’s never looked at Ardyn in a sexual light before, but now he can’t do anything else, and so he looks askance as he asks, “How many days have passed?”

Ardyn only cocks his head to the side and stares.

He tries again. “How long was I asleep?”

“Uh. A night. Did I smack you upside the head harder than I thought?” He smirks lazily, and Ignis feels his gut twist. He wonders how it would feel to have those lips grazing his throat.

Not enough time for anything to heal naturally. Was it only a dream then? _Or did you rape me?_ He wants to ask, but he doesn’t dare. Because he can just imagine how Ardyn would react to that. He’d be delighted. Are you so interested in me that that is what you dream of? No. He can only skirt the subject, though even as he thinks this, he knows that some of his hesitation is because he isn’t sure he wants to know. He’s ashamed, disgusted with himself that he could ever even have such a dream. _Even if he did grope me, he wouldn’t fall so low._ “What do you want from me?”

“We’ve been over this. I wanted you to join me, to work alongside me for my cause, but you’ve proven to be a nasty little bitch and now I’m not sure what to do with you. I can’t very well just drop you off somewhere without drama.”

“Because we both know you loathe drama,” Ignis snaps, curling up on the bed now, aware of how those eyes rove over his legs. _It was just a dream, just a horrible dream._

“I do prefer peace, you know,” he says then, unexpectedly. “Even if I’m hated for it, so unlike the Lucians who prefer peace. _A queen devoted herself to peace and was loved by all_. The word means something different in Niflheim.”

“Get out.” He doesn’t like how Ardyn keeps throwing these phrases out. Ignis recognizes them for what they are, and he doesn’t believe that anyone should know so much about the Royal Armiger.

“You won’t even give me a chance, hm? And you pretended to want to come with me.”

There’s nothing he can say to this.

“I’ve helped you and your entourage along when necessary. Do you really think I am wholly on the Emperor’s side if that is the case? The events at Altissia were unfortunate but….necessary, though I didn’t expect them to go the way they did. Lunafreya…” He sighs then, shakes his head, and for a moment Ignis wonders if he is showing remorse over something.

“I tried to offer mercy, as I know the Astrals are keen on ignoring such a notion. You know this, too. You’ve seen it.”

The vision _. He knows about the vision, that which is between me and the Astrals._ He wonders if he has screamed aloud at night, whispered words that betrayed him, and he is wary. “What do you know about it?”

“Everything,” he says then. “And I need you to help me stop it.”

 

 

  1. **bow of the clever (Winged King)**



_A king was versed in myriad arts both martial and intellectual. This was his crossbow. The bearer skewers foes while flitting around the battlefield._

* * *

 

Ignis is slow to look at him when he enters the room the next day – and it has indeed been a day this time, though the same cannot be said for any other day Ardyn has told him has passed – slow to raise his head and narrow those eyes to glare at him. And something in those green eyes makes Ardyn’s gut clench. _He’s beautiful in his rage_.

His desperation and his loneliness are intoxicating. Ignis, Ignis, Ignis Scientia. _When was the last time anyone looked at you for who you are, not merely what you are? Probably never_. Ardyn digs nails into his palm in disgust before flexing his fingers. _No point in being angry over this. The Royal Family uses everyone. The Astrals use everyone. And I have used him, too, just as I will use him again and again until there is nothing left of Ignis Scientia._

He’s pretty, and he isn’t pretty only because Ardyn had just fucked him and healed him and wiped his memory of it. _Don’t worry. I’ll make you come next time. You will not deprive me of seeing your pretty face in orgasm, of hearing you scream my name as you climax._ But of course he says nothing, because Ignis does not know he is no longer a virgin, does not know that Ardyn had shoved fingers up his broken ass afterwards and healed his innards before hearing the tears in the skin of his ass, the dislocated hip, the bruises and bite marks all over his body.

“Tell me about the vision,” he says softly then, watching the pain in those eyes. “I have had my own, and I suspect they are more or less identical.”

“Your own.” He says it with such sarcasm that Ardyn nearly laughs. _It’s a good thing you’re cute, or that mouth of yours would have gotten you killed a long time ago, you little bitch._

“Probably the same as yours. I’m destined to take the throne in Insomnia, and your dear friend is destined to die in combat against me. And you’re the hapless adviser and friend who must watch it all happen.”

The words wound him; that much is clear in the way he flinches. “And who are you, then?”

He shrugs evasively. He could tell him everything now, but where would the fun be in that? Better to drag this out as long as he can, make the true reveal of his identity all the more delightful. “Niflheim has its own royalty, as you know. Has it ever occurred to you that I might be of royal blood just as much as the Lucian King is? Just because your little schools in Insomnia failed to properly teach you about it isn’t my problem. Our nations were apparently destined for this.” The words are delightful on his tongue.

Ignis leans back against the wall and sighs. His clothes are hopelessly wrinkled by now, dirty and ragged. Nothing he would willingly wear, and his disgust at his appearance and surroundings is growing more apparent every day. “I know quite a bit about Niflheim history and politics and there is no Izunia family anywhere.”

He can’t resist. “Maybe you ought to learn your Lucis history with more care.”

“Excuse me?”

Ardyn waves his hand lazily at him. “If only you’d been born in Niflheim. You’re clever. I could have made you my hand long ago.”

“Good thing I was born in civilization then.”

“Such a civilization that lets your true qualities are ignored.” _Like your beauty, like that wet heat between your legs, like the pitch of your screams._

He glares at him, wild-eyed, as if he knows something. And for a moment, Ardyn wants him to know. He wants to tell him, wants to see the dawning horror on his face as he realizes that his body and his autonomy were taken from him without him even knowing it, that _he_ has laid inside of him and now resides in his veins, his marrow.

But he doesn’t. He only leans forward, smirks at him. “ _A king was versed in myriad arts both martial and intellectual._ Except, the same can’t quite be said for Prince Noctis, hm?” He waits until he sees Ignis bristle before drawing back, raising his hands in mock defense. “Hardly an insult. You’re his adviser and strategist, after all. You’re his mind; most kings lack one.”

“And Chancellors don’t?”

“You’ve surmised I am more than merely the Chancellor by now, though, no? What did the Astrals call me? The _Usurper_? Such an unpleasant word. Can you imagine what it’s like to learn that one is fated to bring about the end of the world?”

“You chose this path,” Ignis snarls at him then, spine locked with rage. “Noctis is supposed to die because of you and your greed. The war could have been avoided. You need not go after the throne of Lucis.”

 _Supposed to._ Ardyn cocks his head and grins at him. He won’t admit that he _will_ die. Cute. “So I chose my path, but Noctis did not? I was not destined to do as I do, and I had a choice, but the man who is supposed to stop me does not have such a choice? If I decided not to attack Lucis, what would Noctis do if he is so destined? I’m not quite following the logic.”

Ignis hesitates now. “Noctis is a Lucis Caelum,” he finally murmurs. “I don’t expect someone from Niflheim to understand how the kings of Lucis have been graced with the powers of the Astrals.”

“Oh, I can’t imagine,” he says drily. And he waits, watching Ignis mull this over. How difficult it must be to blindly believe in the gods.

But Ignis says nothing, recalcitrant, angry, sullen. He pouts a little when he’s very irritated, which shouldn’t be cute on someone his age. Twenty-two, is he? So young.

“Noctis doesn’t have to die,” he finally says then, softly. “I might have the general public and I might feel most at home in a warzone, but I have no interest in ending the world and destroying the human race. I’d rather not be the Usurper, you know.”

As much as he wishes to lie to Ignis Scientia, to manipulate him, to crush him, he finds himself accidentally speaking the truth. Because Ignis _does_ things to him, and he doesn’t understand why.

 

 

  1. **star of the rogue (Crouching Dragon King)**



_A queen spurned the public eye and took to the shadows. This was her shuriken. From near and far, it traces deadly arcs to the left and right._

* * *

Ardyn is in his face again, hovering, slouching around the cell and picking up every bauble as if it were new to him, peering behind and beneath every piece of furniture as if he hadn’t put it together himself only eleven days ago. Because it has been eleven days, hasn’t it? Ardyn refused to touch the lights for some time, and then he began turning them on and off at random, began showing up with food at odd hours and trying to trick him into thinking it had been fewer days than it really had been. _He doesn’t want me to worry_ , Ignis realizes, but he isn’t sure why.

Just as he isn’t sure why Ardyn is so interested in the history of the Lucis Caelum line. _Yes, we’ve talked about the visions. Yes, I can grudgedly admit that there is something to them, to the fact that you have had the same as me. But there’s nothing more to be said about it._

“ _A queen spurned the public eye and took to the shadows._ Do you know why?”

“There are many reasons why a woman would do so,” he says evasively. He knows why. He’d read the books, learned about Crepera, the first queen of Lucis, who lost not only her father and her brother, but her son. A miscarriage at seven months. He’d felt for her, a yawning ache, felt for her in the way only someone who has felt like a mother can, and he doesn’t want Ardyn to think about her in that way. His love for Noctis has made him understand maternity in a way most men do not even know exists, and he has always felt a kinship with Queen Crepera. _Leave her alone_.

“But fewer reasons for men, hm?”

He doesn’t like where this is going, though he can’t put his finger on why. So he only leans away from him, tries not to think about that dream he’d had a few nights ago, and pointedly ignores the question.

“You keep part of your life in the shadows, do you not?”

That’s why he doesn’t like where it’s going. Ardyn’s hand slowly runs up his thigh and he shivers, groans softly. He knows what this man speaks of. That part of him that he’d discovered a decade ago, when he’d first gained an awareness of his own body and as well as an interest in others. The _wrong_ others.

“You’ve never told your friends, have you? Afraid of what they might think? Afraid someone will deem you unfit to be the royal adviser? How many times have you had to sit in silence while they talked about women around you?”

“I…it’s irrelevant. I don’t have time for it.” He swallows hard, shifts his weight slightly away from Ardyn, who is now smelling increasingly attractive, his cologne heady and masculine. Because loathe as he is to admit it, Ardyn is his _type_. It’s somehow even more shameful, to be attracted to men who are very masculine. Big, muscular men. Solidly built men. Men who don’t shave regularly, who have deep voices and vicious attitudes. Who exude power and testosterone. At least if he’d preferred softer men, younger and prettier than he, it would be a little more forgivable. So like women, after all. But to like men like Ardyn, to imagine himself as the receiver in a relationship? _Unworthy._ “Even if I told them.”

“But they can all lust after women freely? Does Gladio have time for it?”

“Is it that obvious?” He blurts out then. Because he’s ashamed and afraid. It’s not illegal in Lucis, not as he knows it has been in the past, but it certainly isn’t something to gloat about in the streets. A defect, perhaps genetic, hopefully genetic, because then he can’t blame himself, but a defect nonetheless. _Unworthy to be the retainer of the king. Unworthy to be the general of the army._ Nobody would openly say it. Nobody would be rude to his face about it. But the rumors and the misgivings would simmer.

“It’s very obvious.”

Ignis grimaces now, increasingly afraid.

“But I suppose that sort of thing is always obvious…to each other, you understand?”

 _So he’s like that. He’s the same as me then, isn’t he?_ He remembers the nightmare and feels sick. He can almost feel those hands on him, prying his thighs open and ripping him apart _. It didn’t happen, it didn’t happen. He’s deranged, but he hasn’t truly harmed me since I’ve been here. In fact, he seems almost interested._

He wonders then. How bad it would be to take advantage of this situation. Because Ardyn is attractive, undeniably so, enough to make Gladio scowl and mutter that women would gravitate towards him instead on the rare occasion the older man traveled with him. A comment that Ignis had felt like a blade across his skin, because he had felt the same, though for different reasons. Ardyn is good-looking, and he is apparently _just like him_. _Maybe you dreamed what you did because you want it to happen._ And he’s lonely. He’d never realized how much he relied on his friends, on their casual touches, until now. It’s difficult, living with a brother, sleeping in cars and caravans with a handful of friends for weeks, and then suddenly going to the emptiness of a single cot in a dark cell. “Ardyn,” he murmurs.

And then there’s a hand between his legs, rubbing his groin for a moment only to slide down further, up over his ass to press against the cleft through his pants. _Two fingers shoved forcefully into him, so roughly that he feels something tear. Teeth sinking into his lower lip, his ear, his throat. Nails raking over his nipples and cock. Boy, I’m going to keep you. And the feeling of being gutted._ He grabs Ardyn’s wrist. “No.”

“No?” But he releases him, even slides over a few inches so to distance himself, and Ignis breathes a sigh of relief.

And then he leans over and kisses him.

 

 

  1. **sword of the tall (Dynast King)**



_A king was built like a mountain, towering over all others. This was his greatsword. The resonating blade rips and tears through foes._

* * *

 

“I just healed you. Every time, I can heal you. I already did it once, maybe even twice, when I brought you back here. Healed your pretty little face. But this time? I won’t grant you that mercy.” He’s salivating at the thought of it as he looks down at Ignis, naked and bloodied and trembling beneath him, one leg chained to the corner of one of the cots while Ardyn leans on his other, forcing them wide apart.

He’s still coherent, but it’s only been once so far. “Is it because I turned you down? I can…”

“Do you really think I want to _fuck_ you?” he says it viciously. It’s what he’s doing right now. Shoving a dagger into his ass and fucking him with the blade while he grows so hard he wouldn’t be surprised if he orgasmed without even touching himself. Yes, he is fucking him, but both he and Ignis know what he’s getting at. _How dare you think I would want to shove my cock inside of you, another man?_

“But you...” And Ardyn can feel his thoughts. He knows Ignis is remembering his hand between his legs, the brush of lips. They had kissed that night, deeply and more than once, had let hands wander over one another before Ignis panicked again and pushed him back. He obviously can’t understand what’s happening now, and his confusion is so sweet that Ardyn feels almost dizzy with need. It had been such an _easy_ thing to exploit, Ignis’ shame at his sexual proclivities.

“I did it to mess with you,” he shrugs, turning the blade in his hand and staring at the rivulets of blood still dripping onto the floor.

There’s a lot of blood on the floor. It’s impressive, how much the human body holds. In all of Ardyn’s thousands of years, he has never really questioned what he does when he heals people. Because he knows it is in part what made the Astrals so angry – he has a power that not even they have, a power originally destined only for the Oracles – and he does not want them to exploit him more than they already have. Better to leave it a mystery. But whatever he does to Ignis as he lays a hand over him and seals his wounds, he must be giving him more blood.

He watches Ignis for another moment before he spins the knife between his fingers again and shoves it between his legs again, into the hole he had just patched up.

And he watches, mesmerized, as Ignis screams and screams and as blood pours out of him onto the floor. He’d already dislocated his hip, fucked him with complete abandon and watched the aftermath ooze from his body. There’s something about the space between Ignis’ legs that’s so very nice. He has a little mole under his testicles and Ardyn wonders if he could cut it off, skin just that little patch of him. Would Ignis notice later? He has a nice cock, too, long and thin with a slant to it and a curve that is as aesthetically appealing as Ignis’ eyes. _Someday I will make you come. Someday I will be nice to you. Someday when you are not owned by the man I so despise more than anyone._ He twists the knife as he pulls it out, and the healer of old residing in his bones knows that Ignis has precisely three minutes and twenty-seven seconds before he dies. Plenty of time to heal him.

So he can do it again. Three times. Four.

A temporary retreat. Snapping off of the lights to leave him in the dark. A few hours of silence. Food. More silence. More darkness. A flickering of the lights. More food. Taunting. Five. Six. Seven. Repeat ad infinitum.

But he doesn’t repeat it forever. Ardyn knows well what forever means, what it feels like, and he knows how to emulate it just as well. He has Ignis for four _days_ like that, days that might be perceived as such to someone as wounded as Ignis is. That is how long he lasts. And then, finally, finally, as he heals him for the thirteenth time, he hears it.

“Ardyn. Please, Ardyn…”

And in his sobs he hears it.

That moment. That moment when he breaks, when he begins to see Ardyn not as his tormentor, but as his savior, because he and he alone can make the pain end.

He stops, plays his fingers along the hilt of the dagger a moment before tossing it behind him. And he leans in, touches fingers to his forehead and curls around him, his voice a fog surrounding the boy, suffocating him.

“Good. Good boy,” and he means it as he strokes his face. “I am a benevolent god.”

And he backs off.

 

 

  1. **trident of the oracle**



_A strong and noble woman was loved by the world. She granted succor to the stars and brought man and god together. This was the trident of her line. It makes allies of the wielder's holograms._

* * *

 

He’s hungry, so hungry, but he doesn’t dare eat the food that Ardyn leaves for him. He hasn’t eaten in days, possibly weeks, but it’s so hard to keep track of time now. Ardyn hasn’t touched him since then. _Then_. The knife up inside of him, between his legs, ripping him apart in a sick mimicking of sex. _Which you’ve never had, which you will never have now, because he is going to kill you here. He let you believe for a moment that there was a chance, a chance for you to survive, a chance for forgiveness, a chance for something which you’d never dared dream of. Someone just like you. Someone who dreamed of men, who touched himself thinking of men. He let you think it was okay. He touched you, kissed you, and you liked it._

_You liked it. And he punished you for it by raping you with a knife, by shoving a blade into your ass. And laughing and laughing._

And then he’d said that. He’d leaned in after leaving him in the darkness for days and whispered that a video existed, that there were cameras in all corners, that the kiss they exchanged had been recorded, that it had been sent to Noctis, to the rest of them. _Don’t worry. I told them that you’re safe here, that you don’t want for anything with me, that you can be yourself here_.

 _When will it happen to me?_ Because Ardyn has already stripped him of his memory at least once, he knows this now. _I don’t even know what day it is_.

Ignis remembers hearing about how torture used to be legal in Niflheim until very recently. And a popular method of torment involved injuring someone gravely, wounding them to the point of near death only to heal them again. To repeat this again and again as the human mind went mad with fear. Because there reaches a point where death is a blessing, where knowing that it will end soon is how one can die with dignity, with a sense of self. But _this_. This kind of torture means that one knows they will live, knows the pain will come again and again and again and there will be no escape. Except to slip into a state of catatonia. _And such a state is coming. It’s coming._

“It’s Tuesday. Would you believe me if I told you it was Tuesday?”

Ardyn. _How long has he been here?_ The lights are off. He lets out a strangled whimper and presses back against the wall. _Don’t touch me. Don’t touch me_. 

“You know. I could kill you, if only you asked.” And Ardyn is grabbing his arm. “ _A king ruled the realm according to divine law and worked hand in hand with the Oracle._ She died, but the king lived on.”

 _I don’t know what you’re trying to tell me._ He whimpers again, half-heartedly trying to pull away _. I don’t know what you want me to say. I don’t know what I’m supposed to do. I want to do what you want but I-_

“He managed well enough without someone by his side at every moment. I’m sure Noctis could survive. He has the others with him, after all. And they forgot about you so easily.”

_I don’t know what you want I don’t know what you want I don’t know what you want_

“You could die, Ignis Scientia, and nobody would care. Your Prince doesn’t need you, doesn’t want you, not after he knows you’re a filthy little cockslut who abandoned him for some Niflheim dick. Three days now I have ravaged you again and again, and nobody answers your screams.”

_Three days? How long have I been here?_

“Do you want to die? I can grant you that wish.”

“No,” he manages to sob. _Noctis needs me. Even if he hates me now. Even if he can’t meet my eyes any longer. I made a promise to the king. I made a-_

But Ardyn is behind him, on top of him now, sighing softly as he lays his weight on Ignis’ back, pushes his face to the floor and holds him still with a hand on his shoulder. “If you don’t wish to die, then you accept this life.”

 _No. No, no, no._ But he can’t speak, can’t fight. He merely sobs, screws his eyes tight and digs split fingernails into the floor and waits for the knife.

The knife that doesn’t come.

“You healed up so nicely. But I bet you’re still so tight,” he murmurs, and there is a gentleness in his voice that makes Ignis quake.

“Don’t worry. This time I won’t wipe your memory.”

And through the haze of fear, through the shudder of pleasure he feels when Ardyn grabs his cock and makes him sob, he is able to hear the words. He hears and as he feels finger shoved roughly into him now, he understands and he knows, he _knows_. _This is not the first time he has pushed himself into me._

And he understands, then. That just as Ardyn has taken his body from him, so too has he taken his mind. And then _what video was he talking about what did he send Noctis what was it what did I do what did I_ do.

 

 

  1. **sword of the wise (Wise King)**



_A king built a mighty wall and protected the realm. This was his sword. It devastates foes with preemptive warp-strikes._

* * *

 

Ardyn watches him for a long time before speaking. Ignis Scientia, naked now, curled up in the corner of the shower stall where he’d been all morning. Because several hours ago Ardyn had awoken him, had shoved him in and hissed that he clean himself, demanded that he strip in front of him. And Ignis had wept, but he’d obeyed. He’d _obeyed_.

_“A king built a mighty wall and protected the realm.”_

Ignis rolls his head on his shoulders and growls. “Don’t start. Again.”

Ardyn looks sharply at him. The fight in Ignis Scientia is truly impressive. Every time Ardyn thinks he has him, every time he thinks he has broken him sufficiently, he gets bitchy again. The reserves of spite and disdain he has built up inside of him are something else. _Something I could almost relate to_. He wonders how well Ignis would have handled his life, wonders what he might have had to say to the Astrals, and the thought makes him laugh. “Come now, I’m trying to be nice. My offer still stands. You help me overthrow the prophecy and we can move on with our lives. You’re just being such a bitch I can’t help but have a little fun.”

Ignis scowls, but he’s shivering as he does it. The fear. Time enough to build on that later. Right now though, right now he can foster that fight in him. Encourage him, groom him, lull him into a sense of security and let him think he is powerful, that he has a chance. He touches the younger man’s shoulder now, feels the thin slick of sweat over it. He’s putting up a front, Ardyn knows this, but what an impressive front it has been.

“That was in the year 606. Over a century ago. The wall went up and the Crystal fueled it. The Astrals and the Crystal alike decided that only a small percentage of the human race was deemed worthy, that only a select few could be protected from not only the wars of mankind, but from the demons, from the Scourge.”

“There wasn’t an epidemic then.”

“The Scourge doesn’t come and go the way you fools think.”

“ _Enlighten me, o wise one_.”

 _Fall on your knees you little bitch. Kneel before me and say that again._ His fingers twitch as he gazes at him, but instead he only says, “I’ll ignore the disgust in your voice for now.” He is pleased. Because Ignis is paying attention to him even now. _I’ll have you kneeling at my feet soon enough._

He has waited two thousand years for this, after all.


	3. Chapter 3

  11 **. scepter of the pious (Holy King)**

_A king ruled the realm according to divine law and worked hand in hand with the Oracle. This was his staff. It smites foes with a blade of light._

* * *

 

Ignis listens in silence for some time. And the next day he listens again. And again, though this day feels horrifically long and as Ardyn calmly shoves him in the shower and orders that he clean himself, he wonders if days are really days at all. His head hurts, his whole body hurts, even though Ardyn has healed every wound he’d instilled upon him.

He listens and he wonders. Because Ardyn has a story for every king, knows their quests and sorrows. He knows every detail there is to know about the landscape, is able to mention this or that tract of land in passing as he discusses the military history of Niflheim. He seems to have scoured every inch of land in Tenebrae, and he knows the lives of the Oracles just as he knows the lives of the kings. He knows the history of the Scourge, the biology of it, and he flatly states that Noctis alone possesses the cure. He knows the Cosmogony intimately, continually swears that there might be a way around the Prophecy, that he and Ignis together can find a way to stop it. And he knows so much that Ignis can almost believe it.

But it’s impossible for him to know this much. Because so little of the things he says are in the written histories, and this Ignis knows well, for he has devoured the libraries in the citadel. These are not recorded happenings. These are things that have been lost to time.

 _Unless he’s lived through them._ Because the stories have a personal edge to them, his voice taking on a harshness. Or unless he’s insane. _He’s probably insane._ But he remembers how Ardyn can heal him, how he doesn’t use potions, how he has his own reserves of power and how he can somehow be everywhere at once. And Ardyn knows so much, knows too much, and Ardyn is _angry_. It hits him then, all at once.

“Ifrit. Are you Ifrit?”

This stops Ardyn in his tracks. The words die on his lips and something crosses over his face that makes Ignis recoil. _Those eyes._ He remembers something about those eyes.

“You despise the rest of the Astrals so much. And you’re…not human.” Because he isn’t. He knows this now. Ardyn is a monster in deed, but he is more than that. He is something _other_.

And suddenly his voice is tight with rage. “On your knees.”

 _No_. Because he’s had a couple of days. A precious 64 hours, where he has not been raped.

“What was that?”

 _I didn’t know I spoke aloud_. He opens and closes his mouth again, his tongue feeling as if his mouth were filled with cotton. _I’m certain I didn’t speak._ _But this man who is not a man is very possibly one of the Astrals. He might well be a being I have worshipped my entire life_ , and the thought makes him sob. _Must I do what he says then? He betrayed the others. He has fallen into darkness. Nobody even knew if Ifrit still lived the way gods live, or if he had been banished, erased, turned anathema. But still, he is one of my gods, one of the beings who granted Noctis’ family their power, who gave me my king_. “Forgive me,” he whispers. _Don’t take him away. Don’t take my king from me just because I have disobeyed you. I didn’t know, I didn’t know_.

“Oh, this _is_ interesting. _A king ruled the realm according to divine law and worked hand in hand with the Oracle._ He was such a pious little cunt, but your devotion to the Astrals might rival his.” Ardyn leans over him.

Or not. _Not Ardyn_.

“Who are… _Noctis?_ ”

 

 

  1. **axe of the conqueror (Chaos King)**



_A king performed great feats of arms, expanded his realm, and made his people prosper. This was his halberd. It wreaks havoc with slow but mighty blows._

* * *

 

It’s easy after that. _So easy_.

Noctis. Easy enough to pretend to be, given how the boy is half-dead inside and Ignis was so horrified and confused that he wouldn’t have noticed any personality discrepancies. Gladiolus Amiticia, perhaps the easiest of all given how Ignis seemed to almost enjoy it at one point and moaned the name _Gladio_ more than once. An interesting fact to put away. Prompto Argentum, though admittedly that one was a little difficult to act. So cheerful, so gentle, so unlikely to do such a thing. Cor Leonis. Quiet and solid and brutal in his own right, not so difficult though not the easiest to be either.

He lets him recover a little each time. Fucks him from behind with another man’s voice, hands, face, dick. Comforts him as he suspects that man he appears as would. Then turns out the lights. Lets a day pass, a _day_ for Ignis Scientia, who has been reduced more quickly in the last twenty-four hours than he has in weeks. Seven or eight hours at best. Turn on the lights, feed him, beat him, _how much time has passed? Nobody knows!_ And then he returns again as another man. Slow, powerful, insistent, relentless.

 _You’re finally good for something, I guess. If you like this kinda thing, I might as well take advantage of it. Can’t believe you were holding out on us so long. I’m sorry but it’s so difficult to resist. Gods, Ignis. I’d noticed when you made eyes at me so long ago, when you were a dirty little fifteen-year-old. Nice to see your legs have grown so long._ He’s probably not accurate in his portrayals, not quite, but such things matter little when one has another man buried to the hilt in his ass and fucking him bloody. Ardyn is almost irritated at how quickly Ignis fell for it, but he is fragile in some ways, easy to exploit and abuse in some ways.

And now, now the crowning glory. Regis. The old king. The adopted father.

He touches Ignis’ shoulder; the boy has long since stopped sleeping in the cot and is usually found curled up beneath the table or even under the cot, naked and wild-eyed and feral. He always jerks awake immediately, always tries to scrabble away. He knows something is not right about all of this, but he is too far gone to understand what it is. Because the magic Ardyn possesses, the ability to appear as anyone he wants to be, is one that no one else in the history of Eos has. There are no recordings of such a thing. No rumors of it exist for Ignis to even consider it. There is no _grounding_ for him to grasp. So he has been forced to accept the fact that someone, something that looks alarmingly like all of his friends has been raping him all week. Or some _things_ , as he might think.

Ardyn hasn’t asked. He’d _love_ to know what’s on his mind, but to ask would betray a character.

So he doesn’t ask. He only pushes Ignis down and hooks his knees over his shoulders

And he leans over and takes his limp cock in his mouth. It’s the first time he’s done this, the first time he’s even tried to give Ignis any significant pleasure, and it only makes the boy sob all the harder. _I should have done this long ago, should have made him despise himself because he keeps getting off to being assaulted._ Well, no matter. He can always wipe his memory and start all over again. The thought makes him laugh around that dick and Ignis must like the vibrations in his mouth, because then he is getting _hard_.

He doesn’t last very long after that, and Ardyn drinks down his cum, grins triumphantly at him and presses a hand down on his chest, spreads his fingers wide and feels his frantic heartbeat as he completes his climax. “Such a _good_ little boy. I’m grateful I chose you to care for my son. You’re so _obedient_ and I never have to worry about a thing when you’re around.”

He waits until his body stops twitching before he sighs in satisfaction and drags him close again, shoves fingers into his ass and scissors them open. He fucks him then, while Ignis’ body is still overstimulated and sensitive, and in the middle of it he kisses him long and slow and whispers, _“A king performed great feats of arms, expanded his realm, and made his people prosper.”_

“Ardyn,” he chokes out.

“It took you a long time to figure that one out. Tell me. Was I so good at playing the rest of them? I only know their faces. But I imagine you know what everyone’s cocks look like, sneaking glances in the Crownsguard locker room whenever you can. Tell me, did I do a good job?”

He can only sob, sob and sob and finally whisper out a strained, “Only Ardyn.”

So Ardyn slaps him. Once, viciously across the face. He will stop. He will stop _this_ pattern, at least, because Ignis had learned his lesson. Oh, he knows that Ignis is referring to the fact that he isn’t anyone he has masqueraded as, but it is a _relief_ to hear his name again. He doesn’t like what Ignis does to him. “Don’t call me Ifrit again.”

And he leaves him.

 

 

  1. **blade of the mystic (Yaksha King)**



_A king rose to protect the world with the Oracle. This was his sword. When swung, it enhances the wielders prowess._

* * *

 

More days, more days. He can’t keep track any longer. He doesn’t know how many times Ardyn has kicked him awake only to slap him, throw food at him and shove him into the shower and fuck him against the wall while he hisses about how dirty he is, how pathetic, how useless. How many times this man has mounted him in feverish sleep and fucked him until he begged for mercy. Enough that he no longer sleeps. Enough that he throws up whatever little food he is able to keep down. He has lost an alarming amount of weight in such a short time. He can’t stop shivering. He feels as if the inside of his throat has been skinned given how much he has screamed. But the worst thing is that he’s having difficulty remembering who he is some days, having trouble struggling out of the fog of horror that his life has become.

“Be grateful I only ever do this as myself now. I am a merciful being.”

“ _A king rose to protect the world with the Oracle_. Do you know who he is?”

“Somnus, the Founder King,” he whispers. So they have finally made if this far, to the end of the line. He wonders if Ardyn will kill him after the history lessons have finished, and it’s almost a relief. _Because Noctis won’t want me now. He hasn’t come. Nobody has come. It’s been over a month now, I’m sure, and I am still alone here. They know who and what I am and don’t wish for me to be with them any longer._ Thoughts of the videos Ardyn must have sent make him sicker than the rape.

“I believe Yaksha King is the correct term. Because he was not the _founder_ ,” and he says the word with such disgust that Ignis’ gut lurches in fear. He does not like it when Ardyn is angry. Maybe he doesn’t understand what this man wants after all. _I’m doing what you want. I’m talking history with you. I’m being your student. Isn’t that what you want?_ Ardyn has continued to mention that they might overthrow the gods and save Noctis, has continued to hint that he’s open to an alliance even as he brutalizes him, and Ignis has to believe. _He will stop the Prophecy, or he will kill me. Perhaps both. Please please please let one come about soon._

He throws a net wide in his mind, desperately tries to guess at what he wants. If Somnus wasn’t the founder, then who? He doesn’t dare mention the Astrals again. “The Crystal?” It’s sentient, after all. Maybe Insomnia was its idea. He’s having trouble remembering properly.

Wrong answer. Because there is rage in Ardyn’s eyes now as he snarls at him, kicks him in the thigh and causes Ignis to yelp. But it barely hurts. He’s become immune to the smaller things, the slaps, the kicks without his full weight behind them. They are nothing compared to what else he is capable of.

“The Founder is what Somnus was _protecting_ the world from. Who. Do you know who that was?”

Oh. _Oh_.

Because Ardyn knows this he should not know. He can do things he should not be able to do. There is something ancient in his bones, something primordial coiling through his bloodstream. He is eternal, and Ignis did not see it because he is _anathema_.

“Me. It has always been _me_. I founded Insomnia. Have you put it together yet, Ignis Scientia? You are a smart one, after all, though it’s taken you longer than it should have. The Ifrit accusation. Tsk.”

And Ignis sees the light behind him, the shimmering shapes of blades. An _armiger_.

The word _impossible_ has ceased to have all meaning _. I have lost my mind. He has won he has won he has won…_

 

 

  1. **scythe of the accursed (True King)**



* * *

 

Ignis is shaking so violently that Ardyn suspects he can barely even see, but he doesn’t blink as he stares at him and quivers.

“All so familiar, hm? You must recognize most of these. _Except._ This one, you have never seen before.” And he holds it lovingly, feeling the weight of it, the heft in his palms as it materializes from spirit to form. But it will always be more spirit than the rest. It is the oldest, the most powerful. “It was once the Scythe of the Sage, but it has since become the Scythe of the Accursed. Beautiful, isn’t it? I never came up with a little saying for it though. Perhaps you can help with that.”

“Izunia.”

He doesn’t know what thread of thought led Ignis to say that single word, but it’s enough for him to continue. “Somnus’ birth name was Izunia. He had an older brother. _Ardyn_. I was meant to be king. I saved the human race from the Scourge, took it into my body with a hundred thousand demons so that others might live, and the Crystal scorned me. The Astrals turned me away, deemed me impure because of what I devoured to save souls. And my brother took on the mantle of Lucis Caelum and ordered my execution.”

“Two thousand years ago.”

“Yes, I’ve had a very long time to hurt, to hate,” he murmurs. It feels good, so good to finally speak of this. And Ignis only stares at him, his eyes growing wider and wider. Ignis with his sharp eyes and soft lips, his delicate curve of neck and starkly visible clavicles. He’s beautiful, so beautiful that Ardyn still aches to look upon him, even after having had his way with him so many times by now. Twenty three. More if he counts the knife. Yes, it feels good to say all of this, and it feels better because it’s _Ignis Scientia_ listening. “I’m also last of the Lucis Caelum line.”

“You’re.”

“I admit I lied earlier. Noctis isn’t alive. He was dead before you even arrived.” He leans back a little now to watch Ignis’ face.

His gaze is uncomprehending.

“Don’t you understand, silly boy? You persevered for nothing. You could have begged for death weeks ago and I’d have granted it. Now? I don’t think I will.” And he falls to his knees and folds himself around Ignis, dragging him close as he strokes his hair and purrs in his ear and silently adores him because Ignis Ignis _Ignis_ has allowed for the truth. “I’m going to keep you until you accept me as your king. Because you were made to serve the royal line and I am all you have left. I am your life purpose now, Ignis Scientia. You exist to serve me.”

It’s slow to hit him. Because Ignis, brilliant little Ignis, has been stripped down to the marrow and he has difficulty formulating sentences now, difficulty thinking, probably difficulty even remembering who he is, considering how slow he is to respond to his name sometimes. But there’s still a little bit of him in there, and Ardyn wants to drag it out of him and keep it for himself. He _wants_.

He wants and he wants, and when Ignis finally opens his jaws wide and emits a piercing, bottomless howl that speaks of a lifetime of rage and sorrow and despair, Ardyn tilts his head back and closes his eyes and _drinks_ it. He has never felt more alive, and in that moment he is grateful for Ignis Scientia, because this boy _does_ things to him.

He is grateful and he is satisfied.

 

 

  1. **hand of the chosen.**



* * *

 

He screams when he feels hands on him. There is no such thing as a gentle touch, only a vicious grab, claws digging into his flesh and tearing him open, hooking around his bones and snapping them one by one as they’re dragged out of him. No, no, no, no, _no_ and he’s howling openly in fear now.

Because there’s not only Gladio there, but Noctis _who should be dead who is dead_ and Prompto and there are three of them and he didn’t know Ardyn had that kind of power, didn’t know Ardyn could gangrape him like this, but the man’s secrets just keep unfurling and he would never let Ignis go after all, would never give him up. He can’t take it any longer. “Kill me,” he begs.

He can see them looking at each other as if confused, and then there is nothing. Nothing but darkness and confusion, and then light and soft sheets beneath him. He can’t believe them, can’t trust them. But they offer him warmth and food. They speak softly and do not try to touch him. Ardyn must be playing a strange game now. But he’d been nice before, had tried to lure him in with a gentle voice and a kiss and a promise to help him defeat the prophecy. He likes these kinds of games, likes making Ignis feel secure. He will not let himself fall for it again, and he fights and screams and keeps himself as small as possible whenever someone enters the room. He wonders which one is Ardyn, if they are somehow all Ardyn. He wonders when he will strike. He wonders, he wonders, but things only get stranger.

Because when he is gently guided towards a bathroom, towards a tub, there is a soft voice and small, narrow hands that ghost over his to take his clothing from him, to tell him to relax and let her know if the water is a good temperature and supposedly that’s his favorite soap, even if it is in bad taste. Ignis can’t even recognize her in the fog of terror he now lives in, but the rudeness breaks through to him. _Aranea_. He wonders if Ardyn can masquerade as a woman. Because he can’t trust kindness. Ardyn has pushed him into the shower too many times.

“Relax, kid. I’m only doing this ‘cause it’s.” She stops and sighs, and Ignis flinches at the possible agitation. He does not like irritated people. “Well. A woman’s not like him.”

“Ah…” but he can’t speak. He can only look desperately. He doesn’t know what he was trying to say, if it was her name of Ardyn’s, but she assumes.

“Don’t ask. He left you with us. He’s done hurting you.”

 _But he’s. He’s Noctis’…_ He tries to work his tongue but can’t, and tears fill his eyes as he claws at his throat. The words are beneath his skin and he must tell someone.

“ _Hush_.”

And he hushes. He ceases to scream, ceases to sob uncontrollably if someone touches him, but he still does not speak. He doesn’t know what day it is, can barely follow the passage of time. But one morning he wakes up and he sees. He sees his friends before him and he knows they have been there all along and they are them and _not Ardyn_.

Gladio hovers by the bedside, book in hand a cup of coffee in the other, as if he’d just been about to sit down. He looks down at Ignis and he says it softly, “You’re home.” So softly, as if he thinks Ignis will break from the mere sound of his voice.

And then the others. Prompto, bouncing on his heels. And Noctis.

 _Noct. Noct._ He opens his mouth to speak but he can’t find air, so he sits up slowly, pulls his knees in to his chest to make himself smaller. There is less to hit, less to kick, and he likes having his thighs together as much as possible these days. But he smiles weakly at them, unsure of what they want of him.

“Glad you’re awake,” Prompto finally says, a little too loudly. “We’ve been waiting to go anywhere ‘cause…”

 _Go?_ He looks at Gladio, then at Noctis, alarmed. _So they only waited until you were coherent to tell you. They are leaving you, of course, after those videos they must have seen, after everything they must have heard you scream._

And Noctis sighs. “Enter the Crystal. I just… wanted to wait for you to wake up.”

Enter the Crystal. So he’s going to do it. He’s going to sacrifice himself to stop Ardyn once and for all. _But we could have fought destiny. We could have stopped it. If only I hadn’t angered him. If only I had done what he wanted, been who he wanted me to. If only…_ He curls fingers in the sheets and whimpers as he presses his face to his knees. _I tried, I tried, I tried, Noctis, but I didn’t know what he wanted. I wanted to go with him to find a way to save you, to put an end to this, and I made a mistake and he proved me inadequate to be your adviser, your brother, and now you’re going to have to die because I couldn’t accomplish anything._

Prompto sighs then, breaking the silence and startling Ignis as he throws himself onto the foot of the bed. “We’ve had barely anything to eat in weeks. These two won’t even try and you should _see_ the stuff Aranea makes.”

“Prompto,” Gladio murmurs, a low growl of a warning that Ignis knows well. _Because I will never cook for them again, because they are leaving. And all he can hear then is Ardyn, Ardyn hissing in his ear as he fucks him again and again, as he beats him and ravages him and threatens him, purring that he is his now, only his._

He remembers almost nothing after the scythe. The scythe. _I never came up with a little saying for it though. Perhaps you can help with that. I won’t, I won’t. You are not my king. You are anathema_ , and he whispers softly, somehow finding the strength to murmur the first words he has spoken since he has found his way home with startling clarity. “A king was so selfless, unbeknownst to himself, that he saved the world from darkness. This is his hand. With it, he heralds in the new dawn.”

All three of them stare at him, stare so long that Ignis curls further in on himself and swallows back the dread. Until Noctis suddenly laughs. He _laughs_ , and he is reaching out and shoving his shoulder. “Are you stupid? _You’re_ the hand of the king.”

Ignis reaches out, and this time there is a hand to take his. One hand, two, three, and he’s sobbing freely now because he knows these hands, these arms around him now. And he knows, he remembers, who _he_ is. The one who made a promise fourteen years ago. The one who now knows the secrets of the Astrals. The one who can stop the prophecy and alter the fate of the world and of his king, because he had walked into the maw of the monster and come out alive. And he smiles as he repeats those words. _“I’m the hand of the king.”_

 

 


End file.
